A Wake up Call for All!!!

dear anukarsha,

i am glad this topic has come up for discussion. i feel very strongly about this topic, but then it is a very controversial one. there will be as many views as people. i feel that it should nevertheless be discussed, as it concerns all of us here and outside. we cannot afford to dismiss the whole issue by sweeping it under the carpet and declaring that it is not a "pleasant" subject to discuss. i shall put down mine here.

the woman was evidently very distressed about something. whatever be her reasons for not discussing it with others. i cannot term her act as black or white. as usual the fact is somewhere in the middle. she committed suicide - i cannot justify this since she had two young children to look after. she should have spared them a thought. but again, we do not know what her reason was. we do not know in what desperate straits she was or what sense of the futility of life she had that she was pushed to take such an action. suicide is not something one does easily. it is after all one's own life and one will always tend to protect it at any cost. it is the basic instinct of self-preservation. to overcome this and to kill oneself, one must be really pushed to the brink. we do not even know whether she was mentally stable.

the saving grace is she did not go without leaving this message saying no one was responsible, in which case so many people would have been harassed for investigations. unless it is a case of outright harassment, i don't personally think that anyone should be held guilty/responsible for anyone else's desperate act - which may be a reflection of their own low tolerance threshold for any kind of mental or physical stress.

however, there can be no justification whatsoever to her killing her two children. she had absolutely no right to decide this course for them. unless of course she was mentally unstable - in that case one can only pity both mother and children.


suicide is mostly (other in cases where it is a conscious decision of one who is suffering from a chronic, incurable disease with no relief in sight) a highly emotional and impulsive act. it is very rarely pre-planned. so i do not think education and literacy has anything to do with this. besides, academic qualifications in our country are hardly a measure of "education" - but that is a different topic altogether


we do not know whether she discussed it or not. if she did, we do not know what advice she was given by her family. how many times that women in marital distress go to the parents only to be sent back with the advice to "adjust". so how do we know the real situation? very seldom do we get a clear picture from the newspapers. as you said earlier, a lot of theories and hypotheses are built by various individuals around the event. so what we eventually get is an absolute pot-pourri of information which is absolutely confusing.

yes, the family is numb from the shock. but where were they when she was distressed. why did she not feel free to talk to them?

i agree with you entirely that although she has escaped human justice, she has another court to face and will have to pay for her karmas in future. there is something called natural justice and no one can change that. so i am content to leave that judgement - whether she is guilty or not - to a higher power than myself. i as an ordinary mortal with all my shortcomings am in no position to sit in judgement of her actions.

i am glad the supreme court has called to do away with an old law which holds attempt at suicide to be a crime. such people do not need to be punished. they need our compassion, help and encouragement to face life courageously.

 

Well said,Satchi :thumbsup. Frankly, you have left nothing for us to say.

yes, Anu I can understand your anguish But these people are more to be pitied than censured though our first reaction is anger especially since they take the lives of their innocent children too.
But why do such qualified person who can support themselves and their family , commit suicide is beyond my comprehension.

 

Well this is one topic where you actually need to assess whether the logical part of our brains are to be blamed or the emotional one.

I had happed to read some article about how people incline their minds to take their life off.
In most of the cases it was found that those who could not fight and stand up against the problems in the weak moment where they would have lost confidence or faith or trust or hope or all of them dare to take any drastic step and do some thing unexpected. In such state of minds you of course can not expect them to write proper suicide notes.

And like Satchitananda's post what we know is only one side of the coin. Now who knows the other part can only decide on and infer as to how could this lady kill her children and then kill herself too.

Mere qualification in terms of degrees will not make us competent. Off late it has been surveyed that most of youth suicides have been an effect of extreme-stress and pressure to achieve more. So the point is just education and job and financial independence will not provide our soul with the guts and courage we need to face the challenges that the world has to offer to us.

What we at this point of time need is to groom ourselves and the next generation on the scales of stress management and inculcate the habit of sitting down and discussing things.This could solve so many of our problems.(Talking it out is one habit we are steadily loosing).

Hope we don't get to see and here more such incidents.

 

i whole-heartedly agree with you on the discussion issue and that things should be sorted out instead of taking such extreme steps. but that requires a radical change in our mentalities and approach towards women and life in general. also, there is a need for counselling centres and help lines for people feeling suicidal to call, where they should feel confident of getting non-judgemental, practical help. other countries do have these help lines, and when anyone calls for help, they keep them talking on the phone till someone reaches them and talks them out of attempting suicide. why can't we do the same thing? what is preventing us? surely, this is no rocket science. when we can send satellites to the moon, why can we not make the lives of our own people more livable here on earth?

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very well said namratha. this is the only way forward. what has happened has happened and we cannot expect miracles overnight. one has to work towards it.